home

ok hi, hi!!! i'm back from a stupendous long weekend home of little lunches around my favorite suburban restaurants, george gershwin being camera shy, finally finding a dress for stoop's wedding, and stoop obviously getting drunk at brunch.

oh and then johnswik, my future brother-in-law, rolled in to sing: when i say afi, you say komen. it only took (formerly little, now really tall) jake about two hours to find it. i think he won a high five?

being home was just so much awesome stillness, like sitting on the couch and watching girls and spending five hours in the spice shop with mum smelling every single spice thrice and painting my nails purple and watching melissa down a robicelli's cupcake on the television with katie and jaclyn while we drank cider. nothing i'd ever be able to do in new york without feeling guilty for not being at this album release show or that new opera or catching up on my new yorker.

and so now i'm back and pondering my existence as a half-way to new yorker brooklynite and mostly i just want to be eating kale in the kitchen with mum as she brushes gracie's teeth. oy vay. -yeh!

the smell that is happening in my kitchen right now, as onions and sauerkraut cook down for pierogies. {that when i google "what is the plural form of..." the first guess that comes up is "moose."}

and the other dumplings that i'm working on for the violet's winter issue!

and the live dumpling-making soundtrack that is going on in my living room right now.

+++

the i-woke-up-at-4am bagel topped with the generic brand nutella that has crunchy bits of nougat mixed in.

+++

crisp morning runs.

+++

celebrating the life of elliott carter: remembering the absolutely enjoyable hours spent on his improvisation for solo timpani that got my butt into college, sitting in a box seat when i was five to see my dad play his clarinet concerto, recognizing that, yes, elliott carter spent his 103 years right. rest in piece.

a dinner here, a lunch there, a bike ride here, a run there.
a carnegie concert, a carnegie concert, an intimate little village concert.
with people i love, people i adore, and people i admire to bits.

a letter from a young reader and a letter from india. new
mustard from münchen and late night matzoh balls.

like the surprise few fries at the bottom of a happy meal, this week was undoubtedly a best.

tomorrow night i will see him play my toddlerhood favorite, carmina burana. he flew into the city a few days before the rest of the orchestra so that he could see dog days and romp around the city with me a bit. we've been eating falafel and spending all of his per diem on dark chocolate and designer salt. he's also been yapping my ear off about the state of orchestras in america, to the point where i almost wanted to pull a van gogh last night. but before that could happen we became happily distracted with a few wonderful events:

on our way to see nick's unbelievable/breathtaking/shut-up-i'm-gushing show, we found ourselves on the street in the village that pops occupied when he first moved to new york, when he was just younger than me. he showed me the exact building, on west 4th and bank, and i had been there. three years ago. to the restaurant on the first floor. on a really extremely terrible date.

then, post-nick-show, as we sipped neat drinks and shared a fantastic brussels sprout small plate, a jingle on his phone signaled the receipt of a photo {above} of a face i've so often made, only it was on my dad. there he was, about my age, with his craycray friend buffalo, and mr. flute and mr. oboe.

can we first acknowledge that buffalo in this picture would get along swimmingly in williamsburg circa the present?

and now what am i supposed to say about my dad? would i be friends with him of yore? is he goofier now or was he goofier then? what would happen in the sci-fi version of my past if 17-year-old him rolled out of his west village apartment on that non-descript october night as i headed into the first floor restaurant? would i tell him to be careful with the swab during his first mahler two? would i advise him not to bite into that fuddrucker's hot dog that cost him so many years of dental surgery? maybe i would just compliment him on his glasses and tell him to get a new bow tie.